Uff Da About Sums It Up!

Well, dinner at Trinity Thursday night was quite an event. The church was filled to the brim downstairs in the fellowship hall with people overflowing in the sanctuary. When we got there, there were cars around the block and about 80 percent of the parking lot of Johnson Funeral Service was packed to boot (no funeral going on either). We bought our tickets from Fern and proceeded to the sanctuary to await our turn as they were calling numbers, 20 at a time. We were treated to of all things a nice little trio of guys playing a string bass, banjo, and Jay Forney on Guitar, singing songs that sounded as if they were taken straight out of the movie, A Mighty Wind. It was hard not to smile watching and listening to them play if you've ever seen that movie. They just didn't have the funny hairstyles is all.

Once we got downstairs there were few empty seats to be had. Mike, Carol & Roger, Terry/Rita, Kristi Grochow, Shirley, Idella, and numerous others were there as were quite a few people from the community at large. We went through the serving line and I figured I'd try "just a sliver" of lutefisk so I could say I didn't wimp out, but before I could object, the server had plopped two heaping spoons of the steaming quivering creation of jellied fish onto my Dixie plate with just a little room on the other half for Swedish meatballs. Howard Thorson was at the end of the line serving corn and when he asked if I wanted some, I advised I didn't have any room left, so just "put it anywhere," reminding him it was like the old days in the school cafeteria to which he had a big laugh.

For those of you curious people, Aaron had been talking up having fish the entire day and when we got there, he still hadn't gotten the hint of what he was about to experience. He went ahead of me in line and accepted a healthy serving of the lutefisk with the meatballs. As I'm sitting there not looking directly at him, I could spy him taking a bite of the fish (if you could still call it that). I managed to force down four complete bites of it (so Dad couldn't say I quit without giving it a fair shake). Aaron started shoveling it in, not really getting the full "flavor" as it were yet. I motioned to Andrew to take a look and before long, there was an older couple in their 70s or so the next table over looking with delight at Aaron as he chowed down on the Norwegian delight before him. Shortly thereafter, though, the taste caught up with him and he announced if he ate another bite, he would lose his lunch, so to speak. I think the "P" word came into play. He went back to his meatballs and lefse thereafter.

We had our first good snow late that night, with the snow remaining on the cars and backyard through Friday. It's all gone now, though the temperature continues to dip into the low 30's with high 20's when factoring in the windchill. I came home this evening around 9:00 to find my next door neighbor directly across the street putting up his icicle lights for Christmas already. I had to go over and ask if he was working on his "Clark W. Griswold" light presentation this year. My house should be fairly easy should the spirit move me enough to do something in that regard. I believe I can just crawl out the second story bedroom windows onto the roof of the porch and string them up from there without having to mess with a ladder, though thanks to Dad and Fern, I have one if necessary.

We have been invited out to the Grochows for both Thanksgiving and Christmas this year. Kristi doesn't have family to celebrate locally with here, so it's basically "the more the merrier."

We went to see Chicken Little at the Galaxy Twin last night. It was pretty funny, a gag a minute. We met Dusty with Kristi and his sister Kaylynn at the theater. There's quite a few laughs for adults too. We now have Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire to look forward to in two weeks. I heard it's 150 minutes long, so should be a nice test of the boys' attention span. It promises to be as good as its predecessors, though, and the boys have greatly enjoyed the first three.